FIG. 7.

Pathway of alkane metabolism under sulfate-reducing conditions based on the pathway proposed by Wilkes et al. (23). The numbered carbons indicate the positions of isotopically heavy carbon atoms (¹³C). The number indicates the metabolic cycle number, and the lowercase letter and subscript indicate the sites of additional label incorporation as a result of pathway cycling. Metabolites that were experimentally detected using ¹³C NMR and/or GC-MS are indicated by asterisks.